PRINCIPLES OF POSTURE IN PRAYER 2: Positioning Ourselves to Encounter God

Continuing with this series, we will now learn the next postures that will help us position ourselves to encounter God and be led by His Spirit to spend our time of intimacy with Him, according to His will, and laying down our agendas to take up His agenda for us. So, some other postures we will cover in this post include:

Consecration or Purification– God told Joshua to command the people to purify themselves because the next day He was going to do something miraculous in their midst. This means that they were required to lay their old wine skin down (their old ways of behaving and thinking), and also lay down their agendas and spend time with the Lord, and follow Him in order to become the new wine skin that could sustain the new wine of the manifestations of His Spirit which He was about to demonstrate.

In this case, they were preparing to cross the Jordan to get to their Promised Land. The Jordan represented the place where they left all dead things, carnal ways, and attitudes of their hearts, and where God circumcised them in order to sanctify them so they could receive another level of holiness necessary to cross over and fight the giants in their new land.

Joshua 3:5 says, “Joshua (to the people): ⁵ ‘Do all the ritual purifications and prepare yourselves because tomorrow the Eternal will show you wonders.’” The Voice

Pray and Watch – Pray by Revelation – This is a crucial key in our prayer arsenal. Praying prayers amiss does not get us answers. James 4:3 says, ³ “You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.” NKJV

Instead, we need to seek the Lord about our circumstances for Him to reveal to us what is the root cause of what is manifesting. For this, the Word says to pray and watch. Matthew 13:33, 37 tells us, ³³ “Be on your guard [constantly alert], and watch and pray; for you do not know when the time will come.” AMPC

³⁷ “And what I say to you I say to everybody: Watch (give strict attention, be cautious, active, and alert)!” AMPC

Luke 21:36 also says, “Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man.’” NKJV

For example, one time I was praying about some financial struggles I was having, and sought the Lord in prayer to reveal the root cause of my circumstance. Praying in the Spirit is very important to dig out these things, and so the enemy does not use in a legalistic way the things that our ancestors or even we have done in the past to obstruct us and to accuse us before the court room in heaven as to why we should not have the manifestation of what we are asking.

So, surprisingly, the Lord revealed to me that one of my ancestors had unknowingly obstructed someone from walking in their calling and this kept the person from walking in his full potential even financially. Learning this, I quickly repented for my ancestor as mentioned in the last post, and asked God that this sin be blotted out and nailed to the cross, according to Colossians 2:14 which says,

¹⁴ “Having cancelled and blotted out and wiped away the handwriting of the note (bond) with its legal decrees and demands which was in force and stood against us (hostile to us). This [note with its regulations, decrees, and demands] He set aside and cleared completely out of our way by nailing it to [His] cross.” AMPC

Another time I was praying for a person who was due to go in for surgery because he had cancer. I started asking God to reveal if the surgery was His will. To my surprise the Lord said no, and instead He directed me to break the curse that someone had done through witchcraft against the man. I proceeded to break the curse and reverse it, then told the person to have the doctors check to see if there was any trace of cancer in his body. He happily reported some time later that the doctors had found no trace of cancer and therefore, there was no need for the surgery.

Other times, I had heard the Lord say that the root cause of someone’s illness is unforgiveness or a broken spirit because someone had hurt the person I was praying for deeply. During times like this, we need to pray for the person to forgive, instead of praying for the illness to go away. Forgiveness will release the healing in the person’s heart and also will remove the manifestation of the illness in the body. The same happens when we pray for the person to be healed from the trauma of the incident that broke the person’s heart (spirit at the soul level) so he or she can be made whole, and the illness may disappear. 3 John 1:2 says,

“Beloved, I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health, just as your soul prospers.”

Praying without ceasing – This is another key to the answers of our prayers no matter how long it takes for us to see it. When we go to God about our circumstance, we need to get His perspective on it. For this, He will more likely give us a Word, usually from Scripture. This way, He is also giving us the sword that we will use to fight the good fight of faith. The bigger the promise the more we will have to spend time with Him seeking to know first the ways of His Kingdom as it is stated in Matthew 6:33 which says,

³³ “But seek (aim at and strive after) first of all His kingdom and His righteousness (His way of doing and being right), and then all these things taken together will be given you besides.” AMPC

We do this by having intimacy with Him, reading His word, lifting Him up with praise, declaring His word and promise over our lives, and obeying every command He gives to us without delay. But when it comes to praying without ceasing, this means that we do not just pray one time about the promise or expected end that God promised us. This is important to do because every prayer we pray and every time we obey the leading of His Spirit and seek Him to learn more of the ways of His Kingdom we need to apply in order to get closer to our promise, we are building momentum until the time when the bowl that sustains our prayers in heaven is tipped over to pour out the manifestation God declared over us. Remember that the bigger the promise, the more time we will spend doing this, but do not grow weary in well doing as Galatians 6:9 states,

“And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.” NKJV

Praying and fasting – There are issues in our lives for which the root cause of the manifestation is removed only when we pray and fast. But this is not the only reason why it is important to do this. We also see in the passage of Matthew 17 that unbelief is dealt with when we pray and fast because the spirit of unbelief gets in the way of our faith to see the mountains before us moved. In this story, the disciples could not cast out the demon that was causing the attacks, first because they were walking in unbelief, but second, because the level of anointing that broke the yoke could only be obtained by praying and fasting. Isaiah 10:27 says,

“It shall come to pass in that day
That his burden will be taken away from your shoulder,
And his yoke from your neck,
And the yoke will be destroyed because of the anointing oil.” NKJV

In verses 17-21 of Matthew 17, we see that the man then came to Jesus after he had gone to get help from His disciples to heal his son from the epileptic attacks by a demon, but the disciples could not cast it out. However, Jesus could cast the demon out because He lived a fasted life. A good leader and teacher leads by example, so He, having lived a fasted and prayerful life, had the anointing necessary to cast out the demon. That is why He told His disciples to do their homework and spend time getting higher levels of anointing to break the yoke of those that came to them to be set free.

¹⁷ “Then Jesus answered and said, “O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to Me.” ¹⁸ And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured from that very hour.

¹⁹ Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?”

²⁰ So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.²¹ However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.’” NKJV

In addition, in Acts 13:3, before Paul and Barnabas were sent out to other regions, the apostles prayed and fasted for this purpose and laid hands on them. Another way of saying this is that we need to prepare for the new things by feeding ourselves spiritually because we grow higher in our spiritual stature so we can achieve the things that God predestined for us and demonstrate  Christ through us. For this, praying and fasting is important.

Furthermore, a word of admonition is found in 1 Corinthians 7:5 for couples about their sexual intimacy when they give themselves to prayer and fasting. Even if one of them does it more than the other. “ ”Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.” NKJV

In other words, first if only one of us is going to fast, we should have the agreement of our spouse to allow us to not have sexual intimacy during this time. But then, whether one or both of us spend some time in prayer and fasting, we should not neglect coming together intimately shortly after so we or our spouse are not tempted by the enemy to defile ourselves for lack of self-control in this area.

More on the next post. To God alone be all the glory. ■

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